


Grave Encounters

by wakeupstiles



Series: 9 Days of Scream Halloween Fics 2k16 [3]
Category: Scream (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blood and Gore, F/F, Ghosts, Grave Encounters AU, Halloween AU, Haunted Houses, Killing, Paranormal, haunted hospital
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-23
Updated: 2016-10-23
Packaged: 2018-08-24 03:11:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8354614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wakeupstiles/pseuds/wakeupstiles
Summary: With one push, she was propelled back, crashing through the window and soaring through the air. As she fell to the ground, she saw her friends standing at the window’s edge, staring down at her, waiting.





	

“Tell me again why we’re doing this.” Brooke mumbled boredly, flipping through the same pamphlet she’d been studying for the past fifteen minutes. On the cover of the little booklet was an eerie picture of a five story abandoned psychiatric hospital, and on the inside was information about how haunted it was and the terrors that resided there.

 _Yeah, right._ Brooke thought skeptically. More like cheap tricks and special effects makeup. Yeah, Halloween was known for haunted houses and other similar attractions, but she didn’t see the appeal. She didn’t believe in ghosts; she didn’t care for “haunted houses”.

Audrey looked over at her girlfriend briefly, saw her sour expression, and sighed as she adverted her eyes back to the road. “Because it’ll be fun.” She said simply, then shrugged and added, “And no one wanted to be in Lakewood on Halloween.” Even though it’d been several months sense Kieran’s arrest, Lakewood was still abuzz with talk about the killer. Reporters still lined the streets of the school and their houses, desperate to get an interview. And now that it was Halloween, people wore Brandon James costumes, they decorated their houses with blood and body parts, they were using their horror as fun. The last thing the Lakewood Five wanted to do was be home to see more Ghostface killers running down the street.

“But a haunted house? _Really?_ ” Brooke questioned in disbelief. Of all the things they could have done for Halloween, away from Lakewood, and they had to be doing _that_?

“Technically, it’s a haunted hospital.” Audrey pointed out.

Scoffing, Brooke muttered, “I’d rather gouge my eyes out.” Audrey barked a laugh at the girl’s dramatics. Crossing her arms, Brooke continued, “Ghosts aren’t real, Audrey. The hospital won’t be haunted; it’s going to be full of props and people in costumes.”

Pulling into Emma’s driveway, Audrey put the car in park and turned to her girlfriend, grabbed her hand and gave it a little squeeze. “They’ll be doing their job to scare the hell out of us. Just give it a chance. It’ll be fun. And if it’s not, just pretend.”

Audrey looked at her girlfriend expectantly, her eyes begging Brooke to come along. After a few minutes of silence, Brooke sighed heavily, giving up and grumbling, “Fine.”

The brunette grinned widely and threw her arms around the blonde. “Thank you!” She kissed her cheek in appreciation.

Brooke couldn’t help but to smile back, though her tone was neutral. “Yeah, yeah. But if this sucks, you owe me big time.”

Audrey nodded. “Anything you want.” She winked and her girlfriend blushed, shifting her eyes from the other girl and smirking. Then she turned her attention to the girl waiting for someone to unlock the doors to let her in. “Hey, Em,” Audrey greeted as she slid into the backseat.

“Hey! Are Noah and Stavo still meeting us there?” Emma asked as she fastened her seatbelt. Audrey nodded, backing out of the driveway and starting towards the highway. The haunted hospital, Markham Psychiatric Hospital, was an hour away in a neighboring town. For Brooke’s sake, Audrey hoped that it would be worth it.

 

 

 

An hour and thirty minutes later, Audrey and her friends were on the second floor of Markham, following their tour guide, Billie and completely enthralled with the terrible history of the hospital. “Back when Markham was running, it wasn’t uncommon for the doctors and nurses to treat patients poorly. But some took it too far.”

“Too far how?” Zoe asked. Noah opened his mouth to answer, because of course he knew, being the horror fanatic that he was, but Audrey nudged him in the side to keep quiet. He scowled, giving her a dirty look, but kept his mouth shut and let Billie continue explaining.

Billie kept her back to them as she spoke, shining her flashlight in the empty rooms as they passed by. “There was one doctor, Dr. Ingles, who would take patients one at a time down to the cellar, where he would perform experiments on them.”

“What kind of experiments?” Emma questioned.

Billie shrugged. “All kinds of things. Putting melted lead in their veins, inserting needles in their brains to test their pain level, autopsy’s while they were still alive, surgeries while they were still awake.” She said it so nonchalantly, like it was normal for doctors to torture their patients.

“He tortured them.” Audrey stated, a sick feeling growing in the pit of her stomach.

The woman turned to them then, nodding. “Like I said, it wasn’t uncommon back then for the doctors to treat patients like that.” She paused, looking around the empty, dusty hallway. The look in her eyes was almost that of regret. Her face was illuminated by the flashlight, shadows darkening certain angles, almost making Billie look like something not entirely human. “In here, patients weren’t considered people. The outside world didn’t know what was happening.”

“So how’d it get shut down?” Brooke wondered.

“A journalist exposed them. Once the public knew, the police had no choice but to shut it down. But by the time the police investigated, more than half of the patients and doctors had been killed. Patients by the doctors, doctors by the few patients who had gotten free.” Billie explained, her head tilted to the side, her eyes wandering around the ceiling as if she was lost in thought, as if she was remembering something special.

“That’s awful.” Emma gasped softly.

No one noticed Billie’s ominous smile as she nodded and said, “The hospital was never reopened. They tried doing construction on it a few years ago, but four people died during it and others reported that they could hear people screaming from the cellar. No one’s touched this place sense.”

Stavo arched a brow. “But they’ll allow you to do ghost tours?”

Billie grinned cheekily and shrugged. “Gotta make a profit somehow.”

They continued walking down the endless hallway, Billie shining her light in every room to show them what was inside. The lights in the building didn’t work, and according the Billie they couldn’t be fixed because whenever new ones were installed, they blew out a second later. So, their only source of light was Billie’s flashlight.

Just as they neared the end of the hallway, a shrill, high pitched scream erupted from below them. Brooke jumped, grabbing Audrey’s forearm and clutching it tightly. The teens eyed each other, asking the same question ‘what the hell?’ but coming to no answer. The scream faded to a laugh, a nasty, gargling thing, and then there was silence.

And Billie was gone, only the flashlight on the floor where she once stood.

Emma slowly bent down, picking up the light and shining it around the hallway. “Where the hell did she go?” She asked, her voice low and shaking. Brooke and Zoe looked at her with wide eyes, shrugging helplessly.

“What the hell was that?” Noah questioned, scooting closer to Stavo, gripping the end of his shirtsleeve. Stavo gave a one shoulder shrug, putting his arm around the boy.

Then the flashlight flickered and sparked out. “What the hell?” Audrey muttered, stepping closer to Brooke, who wrapped her arms around her waist, holding on tightly. “It’s just part of the tour.” She tried to rationalize.

“Well, I’d like it to be over, now.” Brooke said shakily.

The woman’s voice started screaming again, though this time it was closer, and instead of coming below them, it came from above. With the scream came the sharp sound of a saw. Everyone huddled closer together, their arms around each other for some sort of comfort. Then the flashlight popped back on and in the dull yellowish light, at the end of the hallway, they saw Billie. Though she was transparent, the light going right through her, and she wasn’t in her jeans and t-shirt; she was dressed in a tattered, bloody, old hospital gown.

“Hey! Billie!” Stavo called to her, but she didn’t respond. He took a step towards her, but Noah pulled him back and shoved his arm out in front of his boyfriend to keep him in place. Stavo looked at him with raised brows, not seeing the danger yet.

“Don’t.” Noah whispered, shaking his head, not moving his eyes from the woman at the end of the hall.

Stavo rolled his eyes. “Oh, come on. It’s not real.”

“It’s gotta be a hologram, right? I mean—that’s not…” Zoe trailed off, gulping, afraid of the alternative. She believed in spirits, and she believed in malevolent ghosts. If Billie was what Zoe thought she was, then they were in a whole lot of trouble.

“I think,” Audrey said slowly, grabbing Brooke’s hand. “That we need to get the hell out of here.” Then, in a blink of the eye, Billie disappeared and reappeared closer to them, a wicked smile on her face. “Now, now, now!” Audrey’s hand tightened around Brooke’s and she started pulling her down the hallway in a run. The others trailed behind her, keeping at her heels.

None of them looked behind themselves as they ran; just kept their eyes straight ahead and prayed they made it to the exit door in time. They descended the master staircase and flung the front doors open, only to be greeted by another long, vacant hallway.

“What the…fuck…?” Audrey trailed off in confusion. She shut the doors, opened them again, but still it led to a hallway instead of outside.

“This is the way we came in, right?” Emma asked, panic flowing through her like air.

Audrey nodded. “Yeah. We came through these doors.”

“What the fuck? What the _fuck!?_ ” Noah chanted, bouncing from foot to foot, gnawing on his bottom lip so hard he caused it to bleed.

They were too absorbed in panic to notice that Zoe had disappeared. And when they finally realized she was gone, it was too late; Zoe was propelled down the stairs like a rag doll with her throat torn out. Emma let out a high shriek and moved towards her girlfriend, but Audrey grabbed her arm, pulling her back, trying to turn her away from the dead girl.

“We have to help her! We have to help her!” Emma shouted, writhing in Audrey’s hold.

“Emma,” The brunette grabbed her friend’s shoulders and gave them a firm shake. “Emma,” She repeated, moving her hands up to her face and forcing the girl to look at her. “There’s nothing we can do.” Audrey said softly. “She’s gone.”

Emma looked back down to Zoe, a desperate whine escaping her throat. Blood had started to pool around her now, dark and thick. Her eyes were still open, wide and afraid. Emma wanted to hold her, to tell her that she was sorry, that she loved her, but it wouldn’t matter because Zoe couldn’t hear her because Zoe was dead.

“We have to go.” Audrey began tugging Emma’s hand towards the hallway to the left of the stairs.

Emma yanked her hand back. “We can’t just leave her.”

“Emma,” Brooke came up beside her best friend, putting a gentle hand on her shoulder. Emma looked down at the blonde, her tears making her sight blurry. “There’s nothing we can do for her. We have to get out of here and we can’t take her with us. I’m so sorry.” Brooke’s voice was soft yet cracked from crying

“We’ll come back for her.” Noah added. “Once we get out of here and get help, we’ll come back for her.” He promised.

Hesitantly, Emma nodded. “Yeah, okay.”

 

 

 

They’d somehow made it to the fourth floor unscathed, though they were all breathless and full of adrenaline, searching for a way out. The walls were awake with screams, chilling voices whispered to them from the floor, echoing around them like a fog. Some told them to turn away, others laughed that they were doomed. They tried to ignore the sounds, but they had gotten into their heads, driving them mad.

Sighing in frustration and desperation, Brooke slid down the wall, hitting her head on the hard stone and hissing under her breath. “I can’t do this.” She mumbled.

“We can’t give up.” Emma said hoarsely, her voice raw from tears.

Brooke shook her head, closing her eyes. “We’ve been walking for hours.”

“We have to keep walking.” Noah urged.

Brooke shrugged, not making any attempt to get up. Sighing, Audrey bent down in front of her girlfriend. “Brooke,” The blonde looked at her girlfriend, who had her head cocked to the side and a small smile tugging at the corners of her lips. “We need to keep moving. We can’t give up, okay? We have to get out of here.”

Tears stung Brooke’s eyes. She swiped her arm over her eyes, gritting her teeth. After everything she’d been through up until now, losing Jake and her dad and her friends, after everything else she’d lost, she thought she’d be stronger than that. She thought she’d be able to look in the face of horror and say ‘fuck you’, but she was scared. No, she was terrified. More terrified than she’d ever been, because you could catch a serial killer, but you couldn’t catch a ghost. You could put an end to a mass murderer, but a ghost was already dead and you couldn’t end that.

“You can do this, Brooke.” Audrey encouraged, grabbing her girlfriend’s hand and bringing it to her lips, placing a kiss on the soft skin. A few tears slipped out of the corners of Brooke’s dark eyes, but she smiled. Audrey believed in her, Audrey believed that she was strong. She had to believe it, too.

“Okay,” She whispered, wiped her eyes once more, and allowed Audrey to pull her to her feet. Just as the two girls went to join their three friends, Emma screamed. With wide eyes, Brooke and Audrey watched as Emma was lifted off the ground, hovering a few inches in the air like she was hanging from an invisible rope.

Screaming again, Noah and Stavo each grabbed a leg and tried to yank her back down to the floor. “Help me! Help me!” She shouted, and they tried, but their efforts were useless. Emma was snatched from their grasp and thrown back against the concrete wall. She didn’t even have time to scream before she was thrown against the opposite wall, leaving a dent in the fixture. Her friends followed her, trying to help her, desperate the get her down. Blood stained the walls, her head bobbing around her shoulders as she tried to keep consciousness. Emma was smashed into the ceiling before the invisible force let her fall to the floor in a bloody mess.

“Emma?” Audrey whispered shakily, reaching down and rolling the girl over on her back. Audrey flinched away from her friend, standing back up and holding her hand over her mouth. Emma was dead, there was no denying that. Her eyes were open, staring blankly at nothing. Her head was in such an angle only possible if her neck was broken. Blood painted her face and matted her hair. She was gone. And all they could do was watch as she was beaten to death.

“Why the hell did we come here?” Stavo questioned angrily. He pointed an accusing finger at Audrey. “They the hell did you make us come here?” He shouted, enraged. His chest was heaving, his nostrils were flaring. What he was feeling was much bigger than rage, what he was feeling couldn’t be put into words.

“Guys,” Brooke whispered, eyes shifting between her two friends, trying to not look at Emma’s lifeless form behind them.

Audrey turned to the boy, her face tense and red. “I didn’t _make_ you do anything! I just thought it would be fun!” She snarled through a clenched jaw.

“Guys,” Brooke whispered again, the fear in her voice amplifying.

Stavo heaved his shoulders and rolled his eyes, moving his arms wide in a circle around them. “Oh yeah, getting killed by evil ghosts is real fun, Audrey!” He bit back.

“Guys,” Brooke’s voice rose an octave, yet it was still too soft to get the attention of the fighting teens.

“How the hell was I supposed to know this would happen?” Audrey sneered, motioning to the dead body of Emma on the floor a few feet from them.

“Guys!” Brooke shouted, causing the two to finally notice her.

 _“What?”_ They both snapped.

“Where the hell is Noah?” He’d been standing beside Brooke when Emma fell to the ground, but when Audrey and Stavo started fighting, he disappeared. He hadn’t screamed, hadn’t made a sound. Just…vanished.

 _“Shit,”_ Stavo hissed under his breath, rubbing his hands over his face.

“We’ll find him.” Audrey insisted, denial running through her head.

“No, we won’t!” Stavo laughed bitterly, tears already flooding down his face. “He’s gone, which means he’s dead. Zoe, Emma, Noah, they’re all dead!” The boy was nearing hysterics, but Audrey couldn’t blame him. It was a miracle she’d kept it together this long. Her friends were dead. Again. She couldn’t do anything about it. Again.

“We should keep moving.” Audrey muttered, grabbing Brooke’s hand and beginning to lead her down the hallway.

“What’s the point?” Stavo asked, though he followed after the two girls. “We’re already dead. Might as well just stay here and wait till that bitch comes back for us.”

“We can find a way out.” Audrey protested, though she was believing it less and less.

“There _is_ no way out!” He roared, throwing his arms in the air and waving them around. “We’re stuck in here forever. We’re going to die in here. We’re going to—“ Stavo stopped mid rant, his eyes growing large, nearly bulging out of his head. Audrey and Brooke clung to each other, watching helplessly as he was lifted from the ground and snapped in half, his back cracking in pieces.

They screamed, running into the nearest room, and slamming and locking the door shut behind them. “A locked door isn’t going to keep a ghost out.” Brooke mumbled, shining her light around the room. It had been a bedroom once; several beds were turned over, stained blankets were on grimy the floor, and a few pillows were strewed about. There was a large, thick glass window in the center of the room, overlooking the clear night sky and bright full moon.

Audrey turned to her with downcast eyes. “I know.” She agreed. She wanted to protect Brooke, to get her out of that evil place, but there was no getting out. There was no escape.

Brooke flicked her eyes up at her girlfriend and gave a sad smile. She didn’t say it, but they were thinking it. They weren’t getting out. They were going to die.

Audrey stood in front of Brooke, grabbing her hands and lacing their fingers together. “I’m so sorry.” She whispered, pulling Brooke into a tight embrace. 

Brooke wrapped her arms around Audrey. “I forgive you.” She whispered back, nuzzling her face in the brunette’s neck.

“I love you.” Audrey sobbed.

Brooke brought her hands up to Audrey’s face, pulling her in for a kiss. “I love you, too.” She whispered against her lips.

Then they were pulled apart by a force so strong, it knocked the wind out of both of them. “No!” Brooke shouted as Audrey was dragged towards the now open door. “No!” She grabbed onto her hands, trying to pull her back into her arms, but the spirit was too strong and with one final yank, Audrey was in the hallway and the door was slammed shut again, this time for good.

Brooke pressed her ear against the door, but she heard nothing. No screams, no pleas, nothing but the deathly silence.

She backed up into the center of the room, straining her ears for any sign that she was not alone. She closed her eyes, trying to even her breathing. She was going to die. She knew this. But the anticipation of waiting for it to happen was damning.

When Brooke reopened her eyes, her mouth fell open in a silent scream. In front of her, black toothed and covered in decay, was Billie. The spirit reached out and with one push, Brooke was propelled back, crashing through the window and soaring through the air. As she fell to the ground, she saw her friends standing at the window’s edge, staring down at her, waiting.

Brooke closed her eyes.

And she kissed the ground.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know how good this is. Maybe I could have done more/made it better but my inspo is wearing thin. So, I hope it's not too bad. Let me know!


End file.
